


Growing Things -or- Rabbit's Thoughts on Gardening and Mortality

by Born In Captivity- Ineligible to Release (Jashasedai)



Series: Alternate Universe - Tame Racing Drivers [34]
Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Tame Racing Drivers, Gardening, Mortality, Slavery, supposed major character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-27 05:19:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12574560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jashasedai/pseuds/Born%20In%20Captivity-%20Ineligible%20to%20Release
Summary: In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, coping with tragedy is handled in a variety of ways.Rabbit, Mark's RD takes care of Alondra, Fernando's RD's garden and learns about the cycles of life and death.





	Growing Things -or- Rabbit's Thoughts on Gardening and Mortality

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of the Tame Racing Drivers AU. Read the series summary.

**Growing Things -or- Rabbit's Thoughts on Gardening and Mortality**

 

Soft grey clouds were low in the sky. There was moisture in the air. Rabbit felt sure if they were racing today, the track would seem dry, but would be treacherously slippery. Rabbit stood with his hands in his pockets and watched Alondra dig in the dirt with his hands.

He'd watched this same procedure last year, when Alondra had put little bits of wood in the ground and then claimed responsibility when lettuce plants had grown in the place. The lettuce tasted good in salads, but Rabbit was unsure of the connection. This year he said he was trying something different.

Sunshine was kneeling beside him, not ignoring, but not showing any interest in whether Rabbit was there or not. He was the one who had taught Alondra about the plants and what to do about digging in the ground. He patted some bags and gave Alondra an encouraging smile and disappeared.

Rabbit crouched down to watch more closely. Alondra mixed up the smelly dirt from the two bags with the dirt he had pulled out of the hole and then filled the hole back in. [What are you doing?]

[Adding different kinds of dirt. This kind makes the ground more dry and this kind is full of food for the plants. I mix it with the dirt that is here so when the plants grow up, they are used to where they live and the food that is already in the ground.] He patted the dirt lightly.

Rabbit had seen dirt all over the world. It was different colors and different consistencies. Some of it was definitely dryer, and some of it had more plants in it. There were a lot of plants here. Different ones than back home at the Redbull stable. Alondra had explained that some plants liked cool and wet better, and were happier where the stables were, and some plants like cold and dry better and were happier here at Kimi's house. Most plants liked the sun, though, so they were mostly where it was warm and wet, like Brazil.

[Where are the plants?] He asked.

Alondra held up a handful of specks. They were tiny. Rabbit leaned close, they were little brown specks, sort of long and round.

[They are going to be baby plants,] Alondra told him slowly, waiting for him to make the connection. [The ground is their mama.]

Rabbit looked at him suspiciously. [Sunshine told you this? Are you sure he meant it? That sounds like those jokes Sebastian would tell.]

[It works. It worked last year, you ate the lettuces.]

Which, in that case, was now an uncomfortable thought. Rabbit put it out of his mind. It couldn't be real, after all. If plants grew here, it was for some other reason. [What do you do, now?] He asked, interested in the process, despite the clearly delusional beliefs that accompanied it. Maybe the specks told the plants where to come to, like word pictures around the tracks told men where to go.

He sprinkled the specks on the ground in all the dirt he had mixed, at the edge of the garden. A spot about as long as the two of them lying end to end. He picked up the green plastic teapot and started pouring water on them.

[Now what?] Rabbit asked.

[They will grow. It will take weeks. You will see them during summer break.] Alondra turned and went back inside. Rabbit stood and stared at the wet dirt.

They watched the little green plants grow, more and more every time they were home from a race. Alondra would spend some time carefully pulling other little plants out of the ground. He explained that these were bad plants that were going to take all the food from his little plants, so they had to be taken away.

They sprouted little white flowers.

They were called Lion's Paw. Like Alondra's nickname.

Meanwhile, at the races, things were changing. Alondra had a plan that Rabbit didn't know about.

The week after Fernando's home race, Alondra didn't arrive at the track with the rest of the Racing Drivers. Rabbit asked Mancha, asked Kimi and Jaamies, asked everyone, but no one knew where Alondra was.

On the day of the race, Rabbit spotted a familiar figure in Ferrari red getting into Alondra's car. He tried to send to his friend, but his connection was closed. After the race, he got out of his car and darted over, grabbing his shoulder and spinning him around. [Alondra! Where have you been? I was so worried. I missed you.]

He took his helmet off.

Rabbit gasped. [Fernando...what are you doing? Why are YOU driving Alondra's car?]

Fernando's face was sad.

[Alondra quit. He told FIA he would never win for them again. They killed him, Rabbit. Now I must drive in his place so no one notices he is gone. He was right. He will never win again. They have seen to it.] He reached inside the helmet, into the lining where Alondra always smuggled a rock from the track back to his stall at the end of the weekend.

He pulled out a white flower. A Lion's Paw. [He wanted you to have this.]

Rabbit felt his lips quivering. His vision blurred and he didn't see clearly until he awoke from the crate at Kimi's house. He went out into the garden. His flower was just like the ones in the garden. Except...didn't some of those have different leaves?

He looked more closely. Some of those plants weren't Lion's Paw at all. They were those bad plants. No one had been here to take them away and they had grown up and were taking all the food from Alondra's Lion's Paw plants. Rabbit threw himself to his knees and started ripping them up out of the ground. They had grown a lot in the weeks, and they had lots of roots, and pulled up dirt with them when they came. Some of them pulled up Lion's Paw plants whose roots were tangled up in theirs.

Rabbit pulled the Lion's Paw plants free and set them back in the ground.

He brushed the leaves of Alondra's babies and cried for a long time.

The next day, when he went out to water, he found the plants that had been pulled up were all laying on the ground, strangely flattened and limp. He gave them extra water and hoped they would recover. The next day he would leave for another race.

He came back after a terrible weekend to find more weeds. He was careful this time, and they were smaller. The plants that had fallen down the week before were gone, there were just some dried sticks lying in the dirt. They cracked apart when he picked them up, crumbs of them stuck to the sleeves of his wooly sweater.

He hurried through pulling up the bad plants, because it was chilly and Kimi wanted him to come inside and drink hot chocolate with them.

The next week he came home, the Lion's Paw had a lot of brown leaves. The flowers looked different. He gave them a lot of water. Maybe they were just thirsty. The night was bitterly cold. When he went out the next morning, all the plants were limp and flat.

He fell to his knees again, picking them up, trying to revive them, but having no idea how. What had happened?! Why had Alondra's babies died? Rabbit had tried so hard to take care of them. Only Alondra knew what to do. Where was Alondra? Why had he let Ferrari take his life from him?

He knew who he should call. The only one who would know what to do.

He opened his mind and screamed for help.

'SUNSHINE!'

There was a rush of wind and light flooded the world.

'Rabbit. Rabbit. Why are you screaming for Sunny? Wake up, Rabbit.'

He opened his eyes. Timo was staring at him from a cot on one side of the team's room. Mark had the sleeping cupboard door open and was pulling him out. He took a moment to orient himself. The Nurburgring. They were at the Nurburgring, practicing. He had just needed to rest. Kiwi was driving.

[I had a nightmare. Ferrari killed Alondra. They killed him. I tried to take care of his flowers, but they died, they died because I couldn't take care of him. Just like he died.] He covered his face in distress.

Mark held him. [It's alright. Alondra is fine. He's just fine. He's safe.]

Rabbit's mind was unfogging, now. Alondra's gardening was real, but it had only taken place over one year, lettuces early and edelweiss over the summer. [I want you to call Fernando. I need you to say something for him to ask Alondra.]

Mark nodded and pulled out his phone. When there was a voice on the other end, he gestured at Rabbit to ask the question, then repeated it for Fernando.

[The Lion's Paw died, and Alondra didn't care about it. Why wasn't he sad?]

Mark's eyes went soft when Fernando answered for Alondra, with him on the other side of the phone, gesturing his answer. [He says that he knew it was alright, because every spring the Lion's Paw comes back to life.]

**Author's Note:**

> Real People don't belong to me.
> 
> This story is fiction and is no reflection on anyone in it. The story does belong to me, as does the AU in which it is set.


End file.
